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Seeking to take some of the danger out of this situation, the Illinois Legislature is considering several bills aimed at letting consumers know what level of protection their online dating site is giving them.
"Don't you have an expectation when you pay $30 to find true love that it won't turn out to be a sex offender?" asked state Rep. John Bradley, D-Marion, the sponsor of one of the bills.
The proposals would require that Internet dating sites disclose to their Illinois subscribers whether or not the site conducts criminal background checks on its members for felony or sex offense convictions. The bills are part of a larger effort by lawmakers to clamp down on some of the negative consequences of the Internet's pervasiveness, including bills that address Internet gang recruitment, online threats against teachers and increasing the information available about convicted sex offenders.
Bradley's bill, "The Internet Dating Disclosure Act," passed the House last spring but was not called for a vote in the Senate. Bradley reintroduced it this year and hopes it will fare better this time.
But an identical bill filed in the Senate was buried in subcommittee last week, and the bill's sponsor — and chairman of the committee — said he was unsure if he would pursue the legislation.
"I'm going to hold hearings this summer to see if there's even a need for this," said Sen. Mike Jacobs, D-East Moline. "I think this might be an area government should stay out of."
The bills mirror legislation proposed in states across the country, pushed by a leading Internet dating site that conducts criminal background checks already and an industry nonprofit group. The New Jersey state Senate approved a similar bill Thursday. Safer Online Dating Alliance, the nonprofit advocating for the bills, says no state yet has passed a version of the bill into law.
With the Internet's strong tradition of independence, instituting regulations can be difficult. But with the rising profile of the issue of online sexual predators, state legislators have been pressed to pass laws to make the medium safer.
"The idea here is disclosure," said Illinois Rep. Lou Lang, D-Skokie. "There are horror stories about people getting caught up in relationships with felons and the kinds of people you don't want to be involved with."
Lang is the sponsor for the other House version of the bill. He said he was not yet comfortable enough with his bill's language to move it forward.
"One of the reasons we're not moving this forward is a lot of the research hasn't been done. A lot of the impetus is from anecdotal (reports)," Lang said, adding that he introduced the bill as a way "to alert the world that these are important issues."
Bradley takes that concern one step further. "There's a bigger issue than just Internet dating, and that is: How are states going to regulate the Internet? People always say, 'This is interstate commerce. You can't regulate that.' Well, why not? We regulate the speed on interstate highways. Are our hands tied and we can't do anything to protect our citizens because (a business) is on the Internet?"
Bradley might not be alone. Republicans in the Illinois House have made Internet safety a major plank in their legislative agenda this year. The House minority leader, Rep. Tom Cross, R-Oswego, conducted an Internet Safety Task Force last summer, although it focused on what the state could do to equip schools and law enforcement agencies to deal with the dangers posed by social networking sites, such as MySpace.com.
The task force came forward with a package of five bills that addressed different aspects of that question. One bill, allowing schools to apply their discipline code against a student who makes an online threat against another student or teacher, passed overwhelmingly in the House and is moving through the Senate.
Last month, a bill requiring registered sex offenders to publicly disclose their Internet identities, such as e-mail addresses, instant message identities or personal blogs, passed unanimously in the Senate. On Thursday, a similar bill passed the House.
Bradley said he hopes to begin soon on putting together a "comprehensive Internet safety bill."
"I think we need to look at: how can we make the Internet safer, not just in the context of Internet dating sites that are charging for true love, but in these other sites where there have been great concerns."
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